Cane, Laken: New Regime (Rune Alexander V) (2014)

Life hasn’t gotten any easier for Rune. Others against humans, others against others and humans against others does not make for a quiet life for the Shiv Crew. Racism is a strange thing. Inside my head my logical part tells me that the oppressed should be above being racist themselves. But that just isn’t so. The Others have been killed for sport by many humans. Turns out the Others aren’t any better themselves really, because there is always another person whose looks/qualities places them lower on the value-ladder. In New Regime the ones who seem to be the lowest of the low are the Pikes. And the Pikes know it.

Rune asks Owen if he thinks she is evil. Owen’s answer is that she is who she is. And really, how do you define evil? Is it even possible? I doubt it. Rune fights for the people she cares for. In her case those people are the Shiv Crew and their unofficial mascot, Gunnar. For them she would do anything. To her enemies, Rune and Shiv Crew are evil. But the world is like that. We are divided into us and them and the evil ones happen to be all of THEM. The Others, the Humans, the Magic, the Strangers, the Fanatics and on and on the list goes. All of these groups have branches that consider the Shiv Crew disposable, usable or tortureable. And the feelings are often mutual.

Rune is her monster and her monster is Rune. Finally, Rune is coming to terms with that. Both want to be in control and finding the balance between the two is a struggle. While few of us will have to wade through the blood and gore that the Shiv Crew do, some people have to live lives fraught with life and death situations daily. How do people balance their monsters and kinder sides in such situations? Probably the way Rune has had to, by accepting that she is becoming the person she is and needs to find a way to live with.

There is plenty of blood and gore. Some humor. Some romance, although not of the “sigh” variety. Plenty of friendship. Plenty of action. Some really sad situations. Definitely recommended.

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No live organism can continue for long to exist sanely under conditions of absolute reality; even larks and katydids are supposed, by some, to dream. Hill House, not sane, stood by itself against its hills, holding darkness within; it had stood so for eighty years and might stand for eighty more. Within, walls continued upright, bricks met neatly, floors were firm, and doors were sensibly shut; silence lay steadily against the wood and stone of Hill House, and whatever walked there, walked alone.